Colonial BancGroup Inc. has selected two board members as interim leaders.
Lewis E. Beville, 56, will oversee day-to-day operations at the $26 billion-asset Montgomery, Ala., company. Beville, an insurance agency executive who has been a director since 1997, was chairman of Colonial's audit committee and a member of the nominating and corporate governance committees.
Colonial also said that Simuel S. Sippial Jr., 66, became its chairman. Sippial, a director since 1997, had chaired the company's compensation committee. He is president of Sippial Enterprises Inc., a real estate investment company.
The appointments, which must be approved by regulators, likely spell the end of Robert Lowder's tenure at the company he founded in 1981. Lowder last week announced that he would retire from Colonial either when its sale to a group led by Taylor Bean & Whitaker Mortgage Corp. or when his replacements were named.
Taylor, Bean is leading a group that will invest $300 million in Colonial in exchange for a 75% stake. The infusion could open the door to $550 million from the Treasury Department's Troubled Asset Relief Program.
